My Heritage Sampler

   Heritage Sampler

I spent several months on Ancestry.com working on my ancestry.  It was a lot of fun and I discovered some very interesting relatives.  Seems my ancestors have been in America since the beginning of our country.   I have one who came over on the Mayflower in 1620 (on my mother's side).  His name was Degory Priest and unfortunately he died the first winter.  His wife and two daughters came later on the ship Anne in 1623.  She had remarried and traveled with her husband and infant son as well.  On my father's side we have Niccolas Martiau (a frenchman who obtained his denization in England before coming to Virginia) who arrived in Jamestown in 1620 and served in the House of Burgesses!  I also found out that we are distant cousins of George Washington and Queen Elizabeth (also on my father's side)!  Most of my ancestors were from various parts of the UK...heavy on the Brits on my father's side and Scotch-Irish on my mother's side.

So, this prompted me to create what I call my Heritage Sampler.  It's loosely based on a Scottish sampler.  They were usually stitched in bright colors ... mostly reds and greens ... I chose a lighter palette:  CC Mauvelous, GA Sweet Pea, GA Parchment, GA Evergreen, GA Old Brick and GA Lambswool.  The colors just pop on R&R Reproductions 18th Century Rook fabric (30 ct.).  I LOVE this fabric!  There's a light streak across the center and a real "aged" look to it.  One of the women at the framer's thought it was an antique!

Scottish samplers very often had peacocks (usually with seven tail feathers), illuminated lettering (those are the letters with the fancy curlycues), a house or mansion and sort of geometric looking trees.  I've placed crowns in mine to represent my "cousin" the Queen!   ; )

My father has a sampler that was stitched by his great-great-grandmother Margaret Matilda Baron dated January 29, 1834 when she was 11.  Wonder how she would feel to know that this still exists and is cherished today!

My next "mission" is to find out more about Margaret Matilda who married Samuel Tennyson in June of 1840 (making her 18 years old at the time) and had 8 children!

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